
AN 



ORATION 



bELIVERED BEFORE THE 



01 n AUTHORITIES OF - BOSTON, 



FIFTH OF JULY, 1869, 



IN CELEBRATION OF THE 



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BY HON. ELLIS W. MORTON. 



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BOSTON: 
ALFRED MUDGE & SON, CITY PRINTERS, 34 SCHOOL STREET. 

1869. 

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ORATION 



DELIVERED BEFORE THE 



CITY AUTHORITIES OF BOSTON, 



FIFTH OF JULY, 1869, 



IN CELEBRATION OF THE 



gtmtiT-tfjirtr §,nmbersaru oi %\mxuRn Jntujpnbena, 



BY HON. ELLIS W. MORTON. 




BOSTON: 
ALFRED MUDGE & SON, CITY PRINTERS, 34 SCHOOL STREET. 

186 9. 



CITY OF BOSTON 



In Board of Aldermen, July 6, 1869. 

Resolved, That the thanks of the City Council be presented 
to the Hon. Ellis W. Morton for the eloquent Oration delivered 
by him before the municipal authorities of Boston, on the occa- 
sion of the Ninety-third Anniversary of the Declaration of 
American Independence, and that he be requested to furnish a 
copy of the same for publication. 

Passed. Sent down for concurrence. 

BENJ. JAMES, Chairman. 

In Common Council, July 8, 1869. 
Concurred. 

WM. G. HARRIS, President. 

Approved, July 9, 1 809. 

NATH'L B. SHURTLEFF, Mayor. 

A true copy. 

Attest : 

S. F. McCLEARY, City Clerk. 



ORATION. 



To God, to the Fathers, to the preservers of 
our Nation's Independence, are due reverent and 
grateful acknowledgments in this joyful commemora- 
tion of the brightest day in our history. The flame 
of the new-found liberty which illumined that day 
is an inextinguishable beacon to souls oppressed 
who dare dream " that all men are created equal ; 
that they are endowed by their Creator with certain 
unalienable rights." A journey in discovery of the 
causes which culminated in our deed of self-manumis- 
sion, would lead only to an uncertain end. The 
Declaration of Independence was not a single fruit ; 
it was a harvest. Inscrutable Providence had mys- 
teriously sown the seed. The precious germs were 
scattered alike by the burning hands of martyrs 
and the unconscious hands of tyrants. It was the 
will of Heaven that the falling dew of the Fourth 
day of July, 1776, should christen our "Free 
and Independent States." 

But we may conceive that had the religion of 
our fathers been the growth of more genial nurture, 



6 JULY 5, 18f.9. 

or had its exercise been unrestricted, had their 
uncompromising faith been tried in the develop- 
ment of a less rugged home, had George the 
Third spared his beneficent oppression, then had 
the problem of self government been to us unsolved. 
" Sweet are the uses of adversity." 

The Omnipotent veils the fulness of His designs. 
The Puritans, who challenged the perils of the sea 
to wrest religious liberty from the hardships of an 
unknown land, knew as little of religious liberty as 
the men of the First Continental Congress knew 
of civil liberty. 

The religious liberty of the Puritans was a right 
to worship in their own way — a denial of the right 
to others. The practice of their austere devotions 
fixed the limit of the freedom they would have 
planted. They were unsuspicious of the bounty of 
the soil upon which ihey set their altars. They 
dreamed not that the fire of their fierce convictions 
would burn into a mellow light, in which all Chris- 
tian hearts might approach Deity by their own paths. 
Those uncompromising spirits were elected to a 
peculiar w^ork, and the fearlessness, the wisdom, the 
fidelity, which marked their labor, the reverence 
which hallowed it, have won the favor of God and 
the praises of man. 



ORATION. 7 

The period including 1774 and 1776, was 
freighted with blessings so rich, that those noble 
men, who were alternately demanding and imploring 
civil rights, recognized them not. They realized not 
the robust growth of the tree of liberty in their 
midst, till their witless monarch and his ministers, 
as a reward for their unswerving fealty, shook its 
fruit into their laps. This was the period that gath- 
ered the first Continental Congress ; that Congress, 
by which " all old religious jealousies were con- 
demned as low-minded infirmities " ; that Congress, 
in which Patrick Henry uttered the " hope that 
future ages would quote their proceedings with 
applause " ; that Congress, in which the student may 
clearly trace the title of nearly every chapter of 
our political history — it was the period in which the 
summoning rays of the lanterns in the tower of the 
North Church, signalled the advent of unknown 
civil and religious liberties ; it was the period which 
called that other Congress to herald your indepen- 
dence, and mine. 

I have said that the men of 1774 knew not of 
civil liberty. To them liberty was an English pro- 
duction. Their hope was of English liberty. Just 
men, suftering injustice, their eyes opened not to the 
omnipotence of justice. 



8 JULY f), 18 69. 

Franklin, Washington, Jefferson, the immortal 
author of the Declaration, all disclaimed a dispo- 
sition for independence. But the appeals unheard, 
the petitions rejected by the King of Britain, were 
answered by the King of Kings. To that loyalty 
which acknowledged the sovereignty, while it resisted 
the oppression, of the mother country. He offered a 
Republic. Patriotism then became an unconquerable 
force. 

How shall we honor the men and the virtues of 
those days'? Would we render tribute to the most 
upright, to the most patriotic, to the wisest, to 
the most temperate, to the most charitable, to the 
bravest, to the most modest, — all had their 
representative in Washington. " If you speak 
of solid information and sound judgment," said 
Patrick Henry, " Washington is the greatest man 
of them all." John Adams attested the worth 
of " the modest and virtuous, the able, generous, 
and brave general." The chosen of all the Colonies, 
he was particularly the choice of New England. 
A Virginian, he belonged to Massachusetts. He 
it was, who desired to " raise one thousand men, 
subsist them at his own expense, and march at their 
head for the relief of Boston." He it was, who 
gained Boston from the enemy, and to whom the 



ORATION. 9 

selectmen said : " Next to the Divine power we 
ascribe to your wisdom that this acquisition has 
been made with so little effusion of blood." His 
was the sovereign character of the Revolution. To 
him, then, let us pay the homage due to the men 
whose sturdy virtue moulded determined courage 
into the rare deeds which have made us Indepen- 
dent Americans. 

It is most fitting that Boston should have 
set up an enduring figure of this embodiment of 
the goodness and greatness which distinguished 
the past, and should pilot the future days of the 
Hepublic. Happy has been the genius of the 
Boston sculptor in fashioning the plastic clay to 
such happy service. Fortunate have been our 
artisans who taught the willing metal to daguerro- 
type his creation. That work shall be our pride, 
the admiration of all. The treasures of the earth, 
the conception of the artist, the handicraft of the 
artificer have gladly contributed to reproduce the 
form ; let society reproduce the qualities of Wash- 
ington. Said Cato, " The best way to keep good 
acts in memory is to refresh them with new." 



But we are brought to another period in the recol- 



10 JULY 5, 1869. 

lection that his devoted services had been well-nigh 
wasted, but for the unlimited loyalty of the Saviors 
of the Union : those whose presence in our midst is 
our honor ; those whose headstones are their grateful 
country's most sacred souvenirs. 

In the ground prepared for the institutions which 
made our declared independence a reality, there was 
left undisturbed the most baneful poison known to 
political toxicology. 

A revel in the records of the unexampled prosperity 
of the new nation, whose lavish resources ministered, 
in every variety of climate, from every quality of soil, 
out of the native storehouses of noble and baser 
metals, by grand rivers and outstretched coasts, to 
wealth and happiness, and whose government was 
benign, was embittered by the exposure of the rank 
growth of slavery. The good and the wise viewed 
the spread of this evil root with dismay and per- 
plexity. In 1860, the injustice of stolen labor re- 
ceived a decided recognition in the triumph of a party 
pledged to a lawful resistance of its introduction into 
unpolluted soil. Then was manifested the accursed 
sway of the " peculiar institution." So subtle had 
been its noxious influence, nursing sensuality, indo- 
lence and ease, that it was regarded as the vital 
support of the South. Slavery was the balm ; free- 



ORATION. 11 

dom the poison. Secession was to be the antidote of 
freedom; it proved the antidote of slavery. The 
haughty rebels attempted parricide ; they committed 
suicide. As captives of war the slaves were originally 
enforced into bondage, and by a retributive justice, as 
" captives of war " they first gained a deliverance from 
bondage. 

The events which made every day an epoch, from 
the lowering of the insignia of the Union on Sum- 
ter to the raising again of those same colors, are 
too freshly stored in the memories of all, far too 
deeply graven in the hearts of many, to invite their 
recital. 

Reviewing in a glance the thrilling drama of those 
days, we behold again the lurid scenes of treason 
in gloomy contrast with the spontaneous uprisings of 
loyalty. We renew the few days of doubt and fear 
struggling against ever contending, ever dominant 
hope and confidence. 

We see the arms of the Union, now in the halo 
of victory, and then in the darkness of defeat, 
always unflinching, until at last, over the dread 
horrors of war and its unexampled barbarities, 
rises the sun of triumph and peace. 

The integrity of the llepublic is solemnly vindi- 
cated, the crime of rebellion is terribly rebuked, 
the wrong of slavery is sadly expiated. 



12 JULY5,18G9. 

" Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord." Of human 
vengeance none has followed the traitors. It was 
foreign to the noble man chosen as the assassin's 
victim ; it was unexecuted by the people to whom 
he was endeared. When from sickening rehearsals 
of the atrocities of Andersonville, of Libby and of 
Belle Isle, the student of future days would turn, 
in hot resentment, to the pages of retaliation, he 
will find them not. His surprise will associate 
with the wonder of his discovery that England, whose 
outcries against the sin of bondage had been as 
violent as they were hollow, was first to recognize 
the Slave Confederacy. Indulgence has followed at 
the heel of victory. The people have worn their 
joy with forbearance, their grief with charity. 

" High treason," said Bacon, " is not written in 
ice ; that when the body relenteth, the impression 
should go away." 

The blot of rebellion has soaked up too much 
blood, the stains of its cruelties are too deep to be 
efi"aced. They are only hidden by the curtain of 
peace. "Woe to them who shall first draw its folds 
aside. The war has seriously tested, though not 
measured, the nation's capacities ; it has proved the 
constitution elastic enough to bend and too tou^jh 
to break ; it has been happily ended in the face of 



ORATION. 13 

foreign hostility. Shall we name our most deserving 
creditors'? It were a vain endeavor, for, 

" The jewel that we find, we stoop and take it, 
Because we see it ; but what we do not see 
We tread upon, and never think of it." 

The most distinguished generals had a host of 
counterparts in the ranks ; the leader was a leader 
only by virtue of followers ; the courage of the rear 
waited on the boldness of the front. Every uniform 
that covered a loyal heart hid a jewel — every jewel 
was a gem. The people have set one of the most 
brilliant in the front of the crown of government in 
representation of the rest. 

To all the defenders of the Union, by sea and by 
land, a perpetual eulogium is due. 

When the gallant soldier, returned to his accus- 
tomed paths of industry, seeks to participate in the 
prosperity his service has bought, make room for 
him. His interregnum of peril should not dam the 
flow of fortune. 

When the battered veteran, with disabled hands, 
petitions the plethoric purse of trade to comfort 
his half-drained life, let quick memory recall the 
days when the Ship of State was in peril of wreck 
and he saved her. He asks not charity. Pay him 
his salvage. 



14 JULY 5, 1869. 

The sleeping dead have venerated graves, and the 
reward of Heaven. Loving friends and a grateful 
country keep their mantles green. When the smiling 
bloom of Spring gladdens the earth, faithful comrades 
cull her choicest blossoms, and in solemn, sympathetic 
concourse, carry the sweet tokens of fraternal remem- 
brance to the resting places of those whose glory it 
was to die for their country. As the tender flower 
touches the grassy mound of a fallen patriot, perhaps 
a tear bears it company. 



A view of the political world finds the star of the 
United States bright as the brightest in the shining 
constellation of great powers. The sensitive balance 
that weighs governments marks a gain for ours. The 
jealous monarchies, whose counterfeit smiles gave place 
to honest frowns behind the smoke of battle, would 
have us forget their forgetfulness. They reflect that 
the popular government, which has proved invulner- 
able from within, may be impregnable from without. 
The war has strengthened us. It has made dismem- 
berment impossible. The attempted syncretism of 
freedom and slavery no longer vexes us. The new 
cement of common equality is impervious to the threat- 
ening waves of any sea. 



OKATION. 15 

We harbor no apprehensions for our foreign rehi- 
tions. If the force of our fair demand affainst Enjr- 
land does not press its early discharge, it is a valuable 
force to possess. There is, however, reason for con- 
fidence that the availability of its possession need 
never be taxed. If England has agreed with the 
two Johnsons, who wore our authority, while they 
failed to represent us, to a treaty whose w^elcome 
was an unceremonious rejection, it does not argue a 
denial of justice when justice is exacted. Means are 
not wanting to obtain it; but an expenditure of 
threats will njt purchase conviction of the stock 
from which we sprang. Lord Clarendon has lately 
said, " he hoped what had occurred would promote 
and not hinder the negotiations." Towards such a 
disposition we may trust that Motley, succeeding the 
distinguished Adams, after the brief interlude of our 
non-representation, may approach with a dignified 
freedom and courteous firmness which shall secure 
an acceptable result. 

We look from the high watch-tower of our Ke- 
public upon foreign powers with tranquil assurance. 

We observe England following, not by steps, but 
by strides, the behests of the people. A monarchy, 
the government finds its nobility a cumbrance. 
Necessity is engrafting life peerages upon the tree of 



16 JULY 5, 1869. 

hereditary aristocracy. Nature has decreed that the 
cion shall determine the fruit. The nobility of merit 
is sapping the nobility of birth. The people are 
dictating, and the government is modif\ing its 
polity. 

France permits little repose to the coup d'etat- 
crowned sentinel of the empire. The rent-service 
he renders for the tenancy of the throne, is the 
drudgery of interminable watchfulness. Would he 
engage in the pleasing employment of " rectifying " 
the boundaries of his territory — he must watch its 
uneasy capital. When his august neighbors went 
out to battle, they could leave their doors open 
toward France — the emperor was engaged at his 
post. " Paris is France," and Paris is his avowed 
enemy. The recent elections increase the burden 
of his vigilance. He must do more than he has 
done, more than any man can do for the advance- 
ment of France, to dazzle her into blindness to her 
fetters. In his perpetual vigils, one hand grasps the 
throat of liberty. The endurance of that grip meas- 
ures the present rule of France. It cannot last 
long. The people demand, and there must follow 
a modification of their government. 

Spain is freeing herself from the corruption of 
long-endured evils. She is casting down the rusty 



ORATION. 17 

bars to progress. She has driven her arbitrary 
queen into an exile, where she is displaying the 
wealth amassed from the wretchedness of unhappy 
subjects. The experiment of Spain's tardy relief, 
will claim the most judicious heed. Our sympathy 
and best wishes should stretch out to the bruised 
people, who have smitten tyranny in the face. 

If we were to extend our observations further, 
we should still follow the ruts of the wheels of 
political change. We should recognize in every 
foreign sky, the influence of our free atmosphere. 

The present year has witnessed in serenity the 
retirement of one who occupied the Presidential 
Chair, and has viewed with profound satisfaction 
the inauguration of a successor to Lincoln. The 
Presidency has sought Grant: he received it. He 
has never solicited rank ; he has been rated by his 
deeds. An indomitable leader, he asks only to fol- 
low the will of the people. Honored by those 
who have singled him out as their representative, 
his evident integrity of purpose and calm determi- 
nation in its pursuit should enlist unanimous esteem. 

The reviving South will read in his elevation 
the pledge of an equitable administration, and a 
certain defence of loyalty. 

3 



18 JULY 5, 1869. 

The withdrawal from political life of the late 
Secretary of State, has recently followed a long 
term of valuable labor. His state and his country 
have heavily assessed his untiring energy, his 
abundant information and his sound judgment. His 
important service as a sagacious, faithful statesman, 
is entitled to the requital of liberal thanks. 

A survey of our domestic condition discovers 
auspicious omens on every side. The broad stream 
of prosperity, which has never ceased to flow north 
of the fields of rebellion, is swelling and enlarging 
as it courses on. 

Fate is obscuring the identity of the former South. 
Her people no longer take counsel of their false 
augurs. They no longer gather about the leaders 
who took them to failure. Their old idols are 
bereft of honor and denied confidence. The hand 
of Fortune is remodelling the South for a future, 
in which free and enlightened industry will win the 
palm of progress and influence. The weight of 
her new importance will, ere long, be felt through- 
out the Union. 

The waves of emigration continue to roll steadily 
upon our shores. The pioneer emigrants, who 
brought muscle to serve us in grappling for wealth, 
are followed by those who bring offerings of skill. 



ORATION. 19 

While the current from Ireland is unabated, the tide 
from Germany and Northern Europe is outstripping 
it. Emigration from England's intelligent classes is 
also surging upon our borders. The Old World 
sends us a town every week. Every recruit to our 
population has a value. His removal is a loss to the 
place of his nativity, upon whose means he has 
grown, and a gain to us. Every day's labor he 
brings is a contribution to our coffers. Our greatest 
enterprises take shape through the toil of foreigners. 
They keep close companionship with the spirit of 
improvement as it marches over the country leaving 
iron tracks for traffic to follow. They make bold 
acquaintance with the virtue of our soil, and impress 
it into productive exercise. They lend hard hands 
to the workshop and the warehouse. The ready 
absorption of the emigrant's capital proves its advan- 
tage, and is suggestive of the richness of our unde- 
veloped substance. 

In all directions we spy enterprise crowding upon 
enterprise. " The wave behind impels the wave 
before." By the iron-edged route to the Golden 
Gate great railroads are made by-paths. Already 
our commerce is jeering at the resistance of Darien 
to the friendly embrace of the Atlantic and the 
Pacific. The art of surgery is threatening the band 



20 JULY 5, 1869. 

by which nature has tied the twin Americas like 
the twins of Siam. The giant undertaking of yes- 
terday is the pigmy of to-day. 

In telling the promise of the country's future, 
extravagance would be tameness, 

" For thy vast bounties are so numberless, 
That them or to conceal or else to tell 
Is equally impossible." 

After scanning the broad domain of national 
sovereignty, we turn to our own Commonwealth with 
affectionate pride. Though she has freely sent her 
sons and her money to build up new territory, she 
continues in the vanguard of States. She has 
regarded with pleasure the increasing stature of 
rival sisters, fostered by her capital. It may be, 
however, that wholesome prudence is now dictating 
a more rigid application of her means to the 
irrigation of her own soil. 

Her intelligence is undenied ; her political influence 
is conspicuous ; the lustre of her credit is untar- 
nished. In prudent charity, she is profuse ; in educa- 
tion, unsparing ; in legislation, prodigal ; in her public 
models of art, original ; and in tunnelling, a learner. 

We are a law-enacting, law-abiding people. No 
instruction of the " Declaration of the Rights of the 



ORATION. 21 

Inhabitants of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts," 
is more faithfully observed than that which declares 
that, " The Legislature ought frequently to assemble 
for the redress of grievances, for correcting, strength- 
ening, and confirming the laws, and for making new 
laws, as the common good may require." 

The legislature of the last six months has secured 
the "common good "for six months to come in the 
enactment of Five Hundred and Sixty- Nine " Acts 
and Resolves." Imagine the consternation with which 
such a record would fill Jonathan Swift, who, a cen- 
tury and a half ago, said: "If books and laws con- 
tinue to increase as they have done for fifty years 
past, I am in some concern for future ages, how any 
man will be learned, or any man a lawyer." 

We have perfected political science to such a de- 
gree that we make law enough in one day to suffice 
for that day and one more. While the community 
exult in the guarantee of safety for half a year, the 
student takes courage in the opportunity to master 
the laws before they are abrogated. 

The legislature of this year has set the seal of 
assent to that amendment to the Constitution of the 
United States, which declares that, " The right of 
citizens of the United States to vote shall not be 
denied or abridged by the United States, or by any 



22 JULY 5, 18G9. 

State, on account of race, color, or previous condi- 
tion of servitude." The " Fifteenth Amendment " cuts 
at a stroke a Gordian Knot which the studied 
theories of the wisest and most humane have 
essayed to untie. After statesmen had tasked their 
lives in the vain attempt to gently undo the knot 
of slavery by gradual emancipation, it was finally 
cut by the sword of war. It were better, our legis- 
lators have said, to sever this last knot of political 
inequality by the sword of peace. Those who had 
misgivings must have done wisely to smother dis- 
trust, in the decision to execute complete justice 
without delay. 

In our latest legislation touching commercial in- 
terests, we have reason for congratulation. The 
heavy demands of our great railroads for increased 
facilities and extended connections indicate present 
thrift, and a design to propitiate good fortune by 
generous provisions. The readiness with which these 
demands have been heard, and the sound liberality 
which has been their response, demonstrate an ex- 
panding appreciation of our business capacities and 
necessities. Narrow jealousy of Boston, if it has 
ever been entertained, has not found an asylum in 
the last legislature. It has been at once conceded 
that the importance of the capital vitally concerns 



ORATION. 23 

the Commonwealtli, and that in amplifying its 
channels of trade, in magnifying its prominence as 
a market, and in enlarging its space for growth, the 
common welfare is promoted. 

An absurd effort to transfer a department of the 
City Government to the guardianship of the State, 
to satisfy the ill-based prejudices of a few warped 
minds, has met a swift rebuff, as severe as it was 
merited. 

A threat to make an example of Boston, for an 
alleged sluggishness in the enforcement of a certain 
law, was coldly denied the solace of a faint echo. 
Whenever the eminence of our City Government 
shall tempt an invidious attack, it should encounter 
an indignant repulse in the deafening protests of 
every citizen susceptible of honest pride, or the sen- 
timent of justice. Though a subversion of the po- 
lice functions of all our municipalities would escape 
the odium of a blow at one only, the impolicy of 
such a conquest by the State should condemn it. 
The democracy which calls upon the individual to 
contribute only the necessary allotment of his natural 
liberty to society, upon the town to surrender only 
essential powers to the State, and upon the States 
to gauge their contribution of sovereignty by their 



24 JULY6,1869. 

compact, is worth, more than a score of chameleon 
statutes. 

The wisdom of charging upon each community 
the responsibility of preserving peace and order 
within its limits finds its proof in the voluntary 
establishment of the police organizations coveted 
for the State. The owner is the most vigilant guard 
of his treasure. Each community has the closest 
interest in its own self-defence. If disease creeps 
into the body, we invoke ^Esculapius. We seek to 
cure, not to kill. If abuses should steal into muni- 
cipal administration, the people will engage in stern 
pursuit of a cure. Not till our town governments 
are bedridden, should they call for nurses from the 
state hospitals. 

Much time has been consecrated this year to a 
" Chapter " of the Blue Book, whose chief recom- 
mendation to favor is its liability to repeal. In 
the Declaration of Eights, " temperance " is ac- 
counted as one of the principles " absolutely 
necessary to preserve the advantages of liberty, 
and to maintain free government." This " Chapter," 
adopted after most solemn deliberation, in contempt 
of this principle, has put a seductive intoxicant 
under the protectorate of the State. By designed 
omission, an acknowledged intoxicant is legally 



ORATION. 25 

considered non-intoxicating. Temperance repudiates 
such a senseless fiction of law. It is but the 
sorry ally of a party. Let the Muses hasten to 
immortalize our State drink, for laws are transient. 
Our statute books have long since ceased to wear 
the title of " The Perpetual Laws of Massa- 
chusetts." I think Scythia must have had prohi- 
bitory legislation when Anacharsis said that " laws 
were like cobwebs, where the small flies were 
caught and the great break through." Extreme 
legislation touching moral questions has seldom 
purchased permanency. " Moderation is the silken 
string running through the pearl chain of all 
virtues." If, perchance, the cider cask should 
prove weak armor ; if the autumn yield of the 
non-intoxicating intoxicant should fail to float the 
new statute, it may be well to remember that, 
" in medio tutissimus ihisT 

The disposition of the " Female Suff"rage " ques- 
tion for a brief period, recalls our obligation to the 
legislature, for what has not been done. 

The gentle persuasions and SAveet threatenings of 
those restive women, who sigh for entrance into the 
" higher sphere " of caucuses and conventions, have 
been received with a gallantry that must have 
smoothed the refusal of their petitions. Those 



26 JULY5,1869. 

relations of the sexes which nature has ordained, 
and time approved, will govern us a little longer. 
But natiu'e is growing old-fashioned; experience 
loses its value in an age of inventions, and any 
average tyro in theology can explain away the Bible 
to order. How soon man may be led to subordi- 
nate himself to woman, for such would be the effect 
of female enfranchisement in Massachusetts, some of 
us dare not consider. 

"New customs, 
Though they be never so ridiculous, 
Naj', let them be uumauly, yet are followed." 

Timid men already feel the skirts of their gar- 
ments lengthening into petticoats. Women should 
not vote because God has not given them the power 
to enforce their will, and law without means to 
execute it is not law. Woman's strength is in her 
weakness ; her defence is in her defencelessness. But 
such strength and such defence will not sustain 
governments. That man is a criminal who neglects 
to provide the shelter of a roof for his wife, and 
stand ready to defend it. Government is only the- 
shelter of society. Man must erect it, and defend 
it. Woman's law is the influence of her virtue, 
her modesty and her beauty, and that law, read at 



ORATION. 27 

the hearthstone, is transcribed in halls of legislation 
by hands able to maintain it. Those who claim that 
our laws would be purer if women voted, should 
know that they are already better than society is. 
Man legislates, not according to what he is, but 
according to what he ought to be. Our laws are 
as tender of the rights of women as they are 
favorable to the welfare of men. The bounty of 
our government is sufficient for all. It has made 
Massachusetts a citadel in war, a garden in peace. 
" God save the Commonwealth of Massachusetts." 



It is a congenial duty to direct a moment's reflec- 
tion to our sterling city. It would be an attractive 
diversion to invest fancy with light pinions and float 
back to the Boston of yore. Imagination would 
warm with novel interest in hovering over the nur- 
sery in which our city grew from tender infancy to 
chartered majority. It would delight in resigning 
to the waves their old dominion, usurped by solid 
buildings ; in re-carpeting with green the pleasant 
fields, invaded by crowded blocks of stone and brick ; 
in coercing granite piles raised up by ambitious 
trade to surrender their foundations to those broad 



28 JULY 5, 18G9. 

mansions, whose doors opened to the traditional 
luxury of spaciousness ; in replanting those little 
oases, whose now heavy laden soil once knew only 
the delicate burden of flowers ; in giving back South 
Boston, and ceding the beautiful Highlands to the 
ghost of Roxbury. We should revel in an Asmo- 
dean flight over the Boston in which a century ago 
to-day the General Court was contending for the 
inseparable connection of taxation and representation. 

But the Boston which surrounds us, so rapidly 
extending its outlines of warehouses and dwellings 
that their recognition is conditional upon active ob- 
servation, so thoroughly repairing the errors of the 
past, that narrow streets are suddenly lost in broad 
avenues, and little courts in crowded thoroughfares, 
is the Boston which wins our thoughts in this hour. 

Of our culture and refinement, of our fidelity to 
the virtuous principles of early days, let others 
speak. The city's hospitality — to mention it here 
were to lessen it. It is told in almost every tongue. 

But the citizens of Boston may well felicitate them- 
selves upon the fast spread of roofs, covering pros- 
perous trade, productive toil and happy homes, and 
upon the notable enterprises which are stimulating 
activity at every point. 



OEATION. 29 

We are fortunate in a City Government, whose 
judgment does not serve their doubts. 

" Our doubts are traitors, 
And make us lose the good we oft might win, 
By fearing to attempt." 

They have perceived that municipal growth prop- 
erly appeals for improvements, and that bold im- 
provements draw on bold growth. They have not 
doubted, but let the wisdom of liberal expenditures 
justify the rate of taxation. To the city, taxation is 
galvanism. If it excites the citizen, it is an extra 
gain. E-ust consumes the vitals of a community. 
Boston must teach well her children, succor gener- 
ously her unfortunate, defend warily the public 
health, maintain an efficient police (the State permit- 
ting), make damp places dry, hills level, crooked 
places straight, narrow places wide, adorn and multi- 
ply her parks, foster trade, entice commerce, keep 
her " latch-string out," celebrate National Indepen- 
dence, and have "contingent expenses"; and for 
this the assessors' battery must be adequately 
charged. When the battery becomes feeble, citizens 
may hope for a millennium, but should suspect 
decline. 

No recent event is so pregnant with future advan- 
tage as the union of Dorchester with Boston. Im- 



30 JULY5,1869. 

perious necessities, prognosticated in population 
rapidly augmenting, in the swelling hum of traffic 
outgrowing: its familiar limits, and in the loud-voiced 
murmurs of industrial employments increasing in 
extent and variety, have compelled Boston to besiege 
in amity the territory of her neighbors. 

The peaceful capitulation of Dorchester has been 
no less a victory for her than a triumph for us. 
She no longer opposes the barrier of her boundaries 
to our expansion : our magnitude no longer over- 
shadows her, but is hers. Dorchester's lungs will 
breathe for Boston ; Boston's heart will pulsate for 
Dorchester. Our welcome sister but contributes a 
beautiful emerald to the diadem she is henceforth to 
wear 

As we embraced E,oxbury with warm greetings 
last year, as we salute Dorchester in loving recep- 
tion this year, let us hope to extend the courtesies 
of our hospitality to Brookline next year. Annex- 
ation is our true policy, wisely recognized by the 
Commonwealth. Aggregation of numbers is essential 
to the fulness of the importance, the authority 
and the worth which should be destined for 
Boston. Humanity clusters. Throngs attract indi- 
viduals. The larger the population, the faster 
will it gather. But space is an indispensable 



ORATION. v^31 

pre-reqiiisite to wholesome aggregation. Give Boston 
room, make timely i3rovision for healthful increase, 
perpetuate her good government, and those who 
come after us may wield an influence whose power 
shall govern an empire of usefulness, and whose 
usefulness shall exalt its power. This generation 
owes the next a munificent heritage. 

" A setting sun 
Slionld leave a track of glory in the skies." 

The signs of Boston's future eclipse her present, 
as her present outshines the past. But situated as 
she is, she can attain her meridian prosperity only 
by energetic development of every resource. Muni- 
cipal vigor must constantly attend, and sometimes 
launch private enterprise. If, however, her riches 
are but the gradual gain of exertion, she will re- 
member that when Jupiter sends Plutus, he limps, 
when Pluto sends him, he runs. 

Education, the mail of popular government, is 
wrought out in schools whose excellence is Boston's 
chief honor. School-houses are esteemed our best 
arsenals, instructors our best armorers. The jealous 
advancement of learning will be one of the surest 
guarantees of the future of our hope. 

But wealth is corrupting, learning is hollow, and 



32 JULY 5, 18G9. 

art is impure where the Divinity is unacknowledged. 
He alone can intrench our present fortune, or assure 
a splendid future. Let accumulating wealth be 
directed by intelligence, let intelligence be inspired 
by religion, and upon a soil to which patriotism is 
indigenous, the Boston of hereafter, from an impos- 
ing grandeur, shall gratefully turn back to us, as 
we reverently remember those who planted and 
watered our city in days gone by. 



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